I just got my first Hobie Kayak andOutback SUV this weekend. Hope to take it out this coming weekend for a little fishing, exercise and fresh air. I love the round hatches and the forward new hatch design. But I'm thinking little things placed in here will migrate to a place inside the hull where I can't reach.

I'll defintenly use an otter box for the non water proof stuff. Just wondering what others do to secure their items in the hold so that they don't shift around. I don't see any place to attach a tie easily.

First one is using the forward hatch hold down cleats. The bolt they use is threaded into a a plastic nut. It has two undocumented (even dealers don't know this) holes in it that you can use to thread line or bunje cord through. The below picture shows the interior nut with a bunje cord I have inserted and secured with a plastic tie for illustrative purposes. You have to look close in the exact center to see the thread hole the bolt goes in. It's easy to see. Just remove the left one to examine. You can also remove the right one to thread something through, but must then fiddle with the hatch.

The next picture you can just see my piece of PVC to house my FF transducer. It's secured mechanically with a hose clamp (which you can just see) to the sailing mast holder. That way (I hope) the silicone seal won't take any movement force/pressure and will remain watertight when I add water (foregoing any effort to use epoxy).

The battery box idea I offer, but don't really recommend. I did this before I found the poly glue from 3M (see other thread). I took very short screws and used them to hold down the eyelets. I used double overed inner-tube as washers to prevent screw penetration through the hull. I thought I was successful as I could barely detect with my fingertips the screw tip. Alas two of the others then penetrated albeit less than ~1/64. I clipped them off and sealed the pin holes with silicone Not happy about it.

Not shown is the second piece of scrap noodle plastic on the sides of the battery box to hold it in place. BTW for the curious the black thimajig on the battery box lower right corner is a on/off 12v toggle switch recommended by Eagle. It has a waterproof cover you can buy for~ $1.50 And you will also note four wires into the box. I used miniature rubber donuts to keep the holes small. Two wires are for the FF. The other two for the compass which is rigged parallel circuit wise to provide for it's backlight LED.

Third idea would be to use some sort of mechanical device around the scupper hole posts. A simple line tied tight might let you attach other objects.

But I'm hoping the poly glue works. All my previous efforts to keep velcro holders down have ended in failure. If the poly glue works velcro will be a very welcome addition to securing objects inside. As will the ability to glue down eyelets.

First off, welcome to the Hobie site DaddyOh! There are several ways to locate items stashed below decks thru the Hobie 8 inch round hatch. The simplest is to buy a mesh, dive-type bag from Sports Authority or wherever. Just put your stuff in the bag-you don't even need to secure the bag since the friction between the mesh and hull interior keeps things from moving around. If the bag does move, it is pretty easy to see by just looking thru the hull, since it does not move much unless you are doing surf launches, or are in rough water. You could also insert a self-tapping screw somewhere on the interior of the hatch cover and then attach the drawstring of the bag there. Here is a post where I discuss this:

“2. Here is the Sport 8 inch hatch area just ahead of the seat. You can carry tackle boxes here without adding the bungee, but as a general rule, they need to be small enough to fit inside the hatch while underway. Before adding the bungee, I used two Plano waterproof #3640 (blue) and #3543 (yellow) tackle boxes that will each fit inside the hatch. You could use one of each, or two of each, or several other combinations. I also used a Sports Authority mesh bag to keep them from getting lost inside the hull.”

As I promised earlier today: Here are some pics of the new outback and the holds. The round ones are 8 inches in diameter without any bags.

View showing the aft hold with the liftup lid and the round hatch in front of the seat.

Aft hold showing the sail scupper post inside. Looks like a place I can tie a line to.

The hold in front of the seat. No obvious place to tie a line to.

And the rear hold as well. No obvious place to tie a line to.

I'm thinking about attaching a line to the underside of the hatch covers. That way I can life the hatch up and pull out the goodies in the hold. I'll have to drill a hole and mount a plastic or metal bracket under the hatch cover.